No doubt, the results of Tuesday's election mirror the growing disenchantment with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. But the election also may prove to be a watershed. While Californians still have a love affair with the initiative process (almost 7 in 10 support it), the romance may have hit the skids. All eight measures put before voters failed. Even the measure that would have required doctors notify parents before teens obtain an abortion lost by a 53 percent to 47 percent margin. This is the first electoral defeat suffered by those who favor such laws.

Californians may have finally come to realize that the use of the ballot measure is not the best way to make public policy. For one thing, proponents write them as a wish list. Unlike the legislative process, which involves hearings, debates and compromise, drafters of initiatives often write extreme measures hoping to capitalize on public fear or anxiety. As a result, many such measures, such as Proposition 187, often end up in the legal dustbin.

Another example of this phenomenon is the "three strikes" initiative, passed by voters by an overwhelming margin in 1994. Hoping to ride the always-reliable anti-crime wave, the drafters of the measure wrote the most expansive three strikes law in the county. Under the initiative, any one of some 500 felonies can count as a third strike. As a result, 85 percent of those sentenced under the California law have been for nonviolent offenses. An unintended consequence of the law is clogged courtrooms around the state. Civil cases must wait their turn behind three strikes cases, most of which end up going to trial instead of being settled.

In contrast, in the state of Washington, the legislature adopted a three strikes law that was narrowly tailored to deal with violent offenders. Since its passage in 1993, only 93 defendants have been sentenced to prison under its provisions.

Another complaint – oft-heard before the most recent election – is that there are many measures on the ballot that deal with arcane and complex subject matters that leave even the informed voter scratching his head. On the ballot this time were complex measures dealing with electricity regulation (Proposition 80) and the state's budget process (Proposition 76). This is hardly what Hiram Johnson and his fellow progressive reformers had in mind when the initiative process was adopted in this state in 1912.

A final widely uttered complaint about the initiative process is that it is dominated by those very interests it was originally designed to overcome. It has long been observed that seemingly popular measures can be defeated by big spending, special interest "no" campaigns. That is what happened to the drug discount initiative sponsored by consumer groups (Proposition 79). The pharmaceutical industry went on an $80 million spending spree and cluttered the airwaves with a barrage of anti-79 commercials.

Sacramento Bee columnist Peter Schrag has duly noted that the initiative has "... not just been integrated into the regular governmental political system, it has replaced it, and more often than not it hasn't been for the good." Others, such as Jim Schultz of the Democracy Center in San Francisco take a more optimistic view. Writing in his most recent book, "The Initiative Cookbook," Schultz proclaims that ballot measures are a powerful tool for popular democracy and the process needs only to be fixed.

Still, it will be very difficult to reform the system. First, there are widely divergent views on how best to reform the initiative process. And this reality remains certain: There are powerful forces in this state opposed to any tinkering with the initiative process. One force is made up of the political consultants who rake in millions on high profile campaigns and think the system ought not to changed at all. They are part of what Fred Silva of the Public Policy Institute of California calls "the initiative industrial complex." For that reason, I don't share Schultz's optimism about attempts to fix the system.

The truth is that the give and take of the legislative process is a much better way to make public policy, especially on complex issues. True, we have to make the legislative process work better – and hopefully restore the public's confidence in it – by adopting structural changes such as real campaign finance reform. (Ironically, this is one reform that may have to be accomplished through the ballot process.) But once accomplished, the initiative may again be employed as it was prior to the passage of Proposition 13 not quite three decades ago – infrequently.

Ulrich is a public interest lawyer who has been a proponent and opponent of many ballot measures over the past 25 years.